Military families face unique challenges and stressors including prolonged separations, frequent relocations and living with knowing that loved ones are in harm’s way. Penn State has created a new University-wide research center, the Clearinghouse for Military Family Readiness, designed to address the challenges and support the resiliency of military families using evidence-based programs and practices, and develop a new generation of cutting-edge interdisciplinary researchers in this field.

The U.S. Navy's Naval Sea Systems Command awarded Penn State's Applied Research Laboratory a contract for up to $853 million over the next 10 years to support critical defense work. NAVSEA will provide an estimated $415 million over the next five years with an option to renew for an additional five years at $438 million. ARL has had continuous Navy funding since its establishment by the Navy in 1945.

Streamlining the design and manufacture of U.S. Department of Defense equipment, including vehicles, weapons and other complex systems, is the goal of a $48 million contract recently awarded to Penn State's Applied Research Laboratory. The contract was awarded through the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's (DARPA) Instant Foundry Adaptive through Bits (iFAB) program, which is part of the agency's Adaptive Vehicle Make (AVM) portfolio.

The 2011-2012 Penn State Information Assurance Scholarship Program (IASP) application is now available.

Students interested should visit http://s2.ist.psu.edu/IASP/ to learn more about the application process, and contact Rhonda Boonie at rhonda@ist.psu.edu, to learn about an application preparation workshop. The deadline to apply is Monday, Feb. 21.

The College of Information Sciences and Technology, in partnership with Booz Allen Hamilton, will hold an interactive panel discussion on the future of the Department of Defense in Cyberspace at 7 p.m. on Sept. 15 in the IST Building Cybertorium (room 113).

More than 65,000 military personnel have been wounded by hostile and nonhostile acts in Afghanistan and Iraq since 2001. In addition to advances in medical care, recreation programming is playing an important role in reintegrating these individuals into military, family and community life. To help these wounded warriors, Penn State has developed a first-of-its-kind training program for military recreation managers worldwide, a program the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) has agreed to fund through 2011. The first is planned for Jan. 11-15 at University Park campus.

A partnership between Penn State and the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) is allowing IST students and faculty members to work with the federal government and other universities to conduct cutting-edge research in military defense. Penn State is one of about a dozen universities participating in DTRA's Student Research Associate Program (SRAP), which prepares graduate students from each school to help prepare a new generation of defense researchers. Penn State, the University of Florida and North Carolina A&T State universities collectively make up DTRA's Blue Team, one of three teams in the program.

The wind crosses the plains like a steady gust from a blast furnace. The red terrain, flat and featureless, can't divert it. The few trees that inhabit the landscape lean permanently to the north. In the distance, giant Oklahoma and United States flags are pegged, rippling as they extend northward in a perfect line.

Thirty years ago, who would have suspected the Internet? Yet it was back in the '60s that the Department of Defense funded the underpinnings of today's www.world.

Hoping something equally cool (and useful) will result in 2020, a contingent of Penn State faculty joined an exhibition last May meant to persuade Congress to "maintain its investment in fundamental research, even though the payoffs may not be known today," according to University president Graham Spanier, the event's emcee.

Once struck, a church bell ringing somewhere in the octave below middle C will resonate for about half a minute, says Penn State oceanographer John Spiesberger. The same sound underwater lasts 40 minutes—long enough to carry 4,000 kilometers, from the deeps north of Hawaii to waters off San Francisco.